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Category: With Thoughts Like These

Sunday – Sunday, and other musical madness.

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You guessed correctly, today is Tuesday! But in all seriousness it is Sunday January 30th of the year 2022. This is day 47 of my writing every day campaign and I have thus far written seventeen new chapters this year. A fair few of them are under a thousand words, and on occasion I have written a little over that threshold. I have found that to be manageable. Writing some of the three thousand word or longer chapters in book one melted my brain for the day, so I’m trying not to do that. Or if I feel that’s how a scenario is going to play out I’ll break the writing up over two days to save my brain some trouble. Although if I’m in the groove and it all comes pouring out I might just have to go with it, and save my once over after review for the second day.

I’m currently reading the ninth and final book of a series and I am at once both eager to read it, and sad it’ll all be over once I’m done. I could go back and read it from the start, but I want to read new stuff, not constantly go back to my comfort materials. I’m starting to feel the same way about my painting and sculpting. I definitely feel the draw to recreate characters I’ve done before, but then I also really want to try other things out as well. Case in point; do I try yet another Ninja Turtle or give Killer Croc a go, because I’ve never tried sculpting him before. Do I upgrade my Hellboy bust or try a full figure space man instead. I lean towards static busts, but a dynamically posed full figure of a person would be really good practice. I haven’t tackled hands or feet in a long time.

I also have to wonder whether my use of silly titles plays into how widely seen these blog posts get some days. Now “widely seen” is doing some seriously back breaking lifting here. Widely in the sense of what I write is around twenty five people, so do with that information what you will.

Could be a busy week, but it should be a good one. Kids are off for a PA Day on Friday, short week! Enjoy your weekend!

The last frigid Saturday of January 2022.

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We are all nearly one full month into the year now. Heading into an equally cold February, but with paid work on the docket, and a healthy family – thus far.  Had a morning with cartoons and helping to dress the kids dolls in new clothes. Attempting to trouble shoot a doll whose eyes no longer open when it sits up, and making everyone scrambled eggs for breakfast.

Doing a lots of nothing, looking at memes and thinking about how to approach some new work that came in yesterday afternoon. I have all the ground work laid out, templates, tables and colour palette, and a new design based off of their supplied brand style guide. It’s going to be a real looker when done. I just need to give it a good think so that I reads properly and I don’t have to adjust it a tonne later on. Think it through now, will save a lot on revisions later. Is my thinking anyway. Doesn’t always play out as planned, but I think I can do a little extra on this one.

As a freelancer I work as the projects come in, so my days vary wildly in regards to how busy I am. When it rains it pours, and then I get streaks of quiet time in between. Allows me to do alot with my kids that I wouldn’t have been able to do in prior roles. All the better for me!

Come on springtime sunshine, green grass, warmth, and flowers.

So now the drum beats for all out war.

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I’m kind of dreading this part, as the scope could potentially be enormous, and I don’t know how to juggle something that large. I have a feeling – (“I’ve got a feelin’ woo-ooh, that tonights gonna be a go…) that I will introduce a massive scenario, pointing out some broad strokes, and then dive in, tight close up, on some unsuspecting persons face and have the world carry about them with nary a care for the finer points. It’s terrible, I know, but I just can’t seem to care enough to attempt to explore naval battle tactics in space when my current grasp of both the navy and zero gravity physics are tenuous at best, mostly zero at worst. So no – we set the scene, jump cut around it, and get to the point of my over arching story. Stop in for a few with some nice people, see how they are making out in the battle, and then carry on as you were.

For these next few pivotal chapters I’m going to have to revisit my point form outlines, as I have a number of threads to collect and tie together. I try not to get convoluted, even with my run on sentences, I know, I know. Trying to say too much in too short a space. But i think i can get this all tied up, and loop back to the earliest chapters, and some other threads that seem like they’ve been dropped, but i promise they haven’t. I’m trying to build to a big crescendo, and then maybe I’ll have a history professor teaching a class give some clarifying exposition at the end, so that it all makes more sense. Plus leave me some wiggle room to come back later to flesh out other parts of the whole thing that i skimped on, because i didn’t know how to tell that part at this time. Get me? You got me.

A word of warning though, some parts of this may turn into a blood bath. We are talking war stories, horror elements, body horror (potentially) although that feels icky to me. But could prove useful. Maybe a love story portion. All out despiration. Some courageous moments, and then some funny dialogue moments, and some far flung science fiction to wrangle the pieces all together. Sound like fun? Yeah – come on. Stick with me now. Book two has just finished chapter sixteen, you’ve got four to six chapters left in you right!?! I hope so. For my sake as well.

In other news, going to be a big football weekend again. So that will be fun. I wonder if these games will have the same caliber of excitement as last weekends games did. Whoo-boy right up to the closing seconds with the will they, won’t they story arc.

Also – as an aside. I’m finally getting around to painting last years two finished sculpts. The old man of the see, who has a passing resemblance to Christopher Plummer, was done as a faux bronze, and the Ogre is very blue. Maybe he needs a grey wash over top, not sure. Needs something to tie him together and be more than layered blue dry brushing. Keep on putting pens to paper!

This 45 doesn’t have an army of red hats. Thankfully.

You want me to do WHAT? In this gig-economy!

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You’re off your tits mate. And other such fun snippets of dialogue I either overhear at the school drop off, or television, movies and think. Ha. That gives me an idea. But not so much today.

It’s Thursday, my dudes. Not quite the weekend but it can be seen and felt from here. Although with working from home, and for myself, it all rather feels the same. Well, maybe now that my wife and kids are back to school (for however long that manages to last) the weekends will feel a slight twinge of otherness to them, with the house full from sun up to sun down.

In other news Valentine’s Day is just around the corner, followed closely by a week or so is Family Day, then we have March break, and the slow drag into springtime! Yay! Which is a lovely thought, but we have six weeks of horrible sub zero temperatures, snow, ice, freezing rain and slush to wade through first. Can 8 just say this though. I’ve enjoyed all of the blue sky sunnies days we’ve been having. It’s really something wonderful to be cold and yet have that gorgeous open blue sky overhead. What little heat we can feel on our faces directly from the sun is welcomed with open arms.

Rather than doing a grocery pick up like usual, or a delivery; I actually went inside a store yesterday. For the first time in a number of weeks. Good and empty, given our current pickle (pandemic obvs’) to grab a bunch of ready made meals for my wife to have at work. When it’s quiet, and no one else is around and you forget you have a mask on, it can almost feel normal-ish. I can’t recall the last time I took my kids to wander around a mall to just look at what’s new, visit a play place, or have lunch out together. I think we’d have still been using a stroller and rear facing car seat for my youngest the last time I did that.

That’s what stings right now. I was looking forward to taking my kids out of school surreptitiously to go to the mall and have an afternoon together and do something fun. But I don’t want to add even a scintilla of additional exposure over and above what they all ready face. In the years to come, I hope to be able to resurrect that mental health day time together. I miss that time doing something fun one on one with either of my kids. Lego land, Square One, The Bass Pro Shop, a Massive Disney Store, or Toys R Us. I used to love just going for a walk around, while the weather outside was horrendously cold. Get some excercise, mock youth fashion trends, because I’m older now, and I’m keen on my late nineties/early two thousands fashion choices that I made that suited my body type and wallet.

Trust in me – just in me… where’s my copy of The Jungle Book!

Also – the gig economy sucks balls. I don’t want to HAVE to turn every hobby into cash flow, that’s just part time work, on top of your day job. That’s no way to live. I get the Type A’s who are physically incapable of resting might be drawn to that option, but you have to have down time to recharge. You’ll burn yourself out. For what an extra couple of bucks, but no time to read, draw, paint, sew, play an instrument or relax. I get that wages sort of suck, and have done for ages, but that type of self deprivation isn’t sustainable in the long term. I hope you can find a happy medium. Or strike it rich! Or discover a wealthy patron who will fund you in the event of their death.

What does forty three (43) days mean to you.

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I’ll tell you what it means to me. A flat plateau, and a bit of a slog. Feeling as though I’m treading water and gaining no new ground. However, on the upside, if there is one and I can call it that. There is a certain satisfaction in following along with the process and maintaining discipline. It’s not much, but it’s honest work. There was never any guarantee that a spark would ignite everyday. Just the knowledge that making the time, sitting down and doing the thing, eventually, something would come of it. Could be that I’m passed the creative hump, and I just need to wrap it up in another six chapters or so. Could be I’ll find myself thirty five hundred words into a chapter and think, oh this needs more context, this needs to be explored. Or I’ll wrap it all up an a bow, spring will arrive and I can work outdoors again. It could be that I have a fantastic supply of paid work and I am devoting more brain power to my business than I did at the tail end of December, and I’m not at peak, rested, creative writing performance. Could be I’ll hear a funny comment and that’ll take me off on a tangent. Maybe I just wanted to bitch and whine, then carry on as before. I can be fickle, so that’s why pushing along with the process is so important. Without it, I can flounder and then spend hours following YouTube rabbit holes. Life is weird that way.

On a typical day, I need to get my kids sorted for school: breakfast, lunches made, hair & teeth. Set out clothes for the youngest. Get their outdoor gear ready by the door. Drop them off and run errands. Then once I’m home I can check emails for priority clients, work, or sit down to my own breakfast and have a think. That would be when I bust out the trusty phone and clickety clack my way through a blog post, thought, joke or retelling of something that’s happened, or ruminate on what’s to come for my short story series. Then I’ll take some time for laundry, cleaning up, dishes and vacuuming, or scrubbing bathrooms and sinks. Then check emails again, if I’ve missed any notifications, and carry on.

I’m not writing an epic fantasy novel, so setting aside ten to fifteen minutes to publish something isn’t that big a deal. I try not to judge my work against others, but that’s really fucking hard to do. But I write for me, even if I do chase those view statistics some days.

Do any of you have a process you’d feel comfortable sharing? I should also note – as I have said previously; I write on my phone because sitting at my office chair is where I do my paid day job, and I want to be able to walk around, talk aloud, act things out as I go (if need be) rather than be perched at my desk longer than I have to be. Trying very hard not to get an RSI on my right wrist ever again. It sounded like twisting a leather glove when my tendons got inflamed. Oh that hurts, just thinking about it. Couldn’t rotate my right wrist & radius it hurt so bad. But I digress.

Blood for the blood god, and all that jazz.

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I knew I was going to kill him off, and I do hope it was at least a little sad / stirring to read of his ignoble death at the hands of the some unseen interloper. I wanted to show that even though he didn’t know what was being asked of him by the voice, due to his augmentation via neural inhibitors and synaptic implants by The Company while training on Mars. That deep down he kinda knew that he wasn’t always doing what he was supposed to be doing. Far down deep inside he knew he was being used for nefarious reasons. He just couldn’t break the hard wired technology, nor the brainwashing. Only having momentary snippets in the brief moments between reading orders and them being carried out by the hardware inside him. The bottle neck of electrical impulses through meat. A mere glimpse at what was to happen.

Why else keep those of his kind in constant isolation, and be able to use them until they’re almost dead. Are they ghosts because they are essentially the walking dead? Rich beyond measure but no time to ever see the benefit. Huge chunks of their daily lives obscured from their memory. Cast aside on the whim of others. It was sad for me, and I thought him up! I don’t usually get saddened by lopping off characters, left, right and center. This one, as they say – hit a little different.

I hurt myself yesterday

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Trying to clear a path for my kids to toboggan down a really good hill at our family farm property. Caught a ski and flipped onto my elbow/shoulder like a forty something out of shape idiot, and now have a sore arm/elbow/shoulder. What’s worse is that I feel guilty for sending my kids back to in person learning. Ugh. It’s been really hard to sleep and it weighs heavy on my mind, all day, every day. No bruising as of yet from my physical fall. Probably won’t be any. Takes a fair amount to make me bruise up. Not as much to make me feel guilty.

Day 41, and what have we learned? Still not very eloquent or graceful with the written word. Feeling less concerned about the quality or quantity of my writing. At this point I’m aiming to have chapters done, not perfect, but a chunk at a time finished and uploaded for all to see. It can be an adrenaline rush once I get on a roll and I can see just over the horizon for something unexpected coming my way. I have a ways to go yet to wrap things up. I won’t give a quantitative answer to chapter count, but I know quality wise where I’d like to hit, and how I think I might wrap the story up in a nice little bow. I believe I had twenty two chapters for the first book, plus various one off shorts, and book two already has a few one offs written and compiled along with the twelve chapters I’ve written for book two.

I wonder if I’ll try to do something similar in another universe or if I’ll keep coming back to this well repeatedly. All the best to you for 2022! Keep on writing and sharing!

The Chronic-What!-cles of the suburban dad.

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Ha. No, nothing that cool or awesome I’m afraid. Just me and my thoughts to keep us warm. Like a nice pair of wool socks but for your brain and eyes. We’ve had more snow, of course. Not the massive dumping of a week ago, but enough I’ll need to shovel out the driveway, walks and back patio areas to try to stop the basement from flooding during the February and March thaws. That’s the fun time of year when we get snow, then ice storms then heavy rains and a weird heat wave in the span of a week two months in a row, and it will wreak havoc on everything. But not there yet, still clearly in the midst of sub zero temperatures, wind chill, ice and the occasional snowfall. The wind chill also brings us great hits such as snow drifts on major roads, white outs, the nauseating feeling of traveling without moving when driving at night, and the snow is blowing through your head lights like stars as you jump to hyper space a la Star Wars. The only reason we suffer through it is that it kills off many warm weather bugs, spiders and snakes and such. If we still had Australia’s selection of deadly bugs and reptiles plus this bitter cold I’d have left years ago!

I think I may be closing in on forty continuous days of writing. Which at first seems like a lot, but most likely has accumulated little more than a few thousand jumble letters. I’m willing to bet that because I write on my phone rather that at a computer the process is slower than it could be, but if I’m at my computer I am usually working on paid stuff, so that isn’t a fun position for me to write in. That’s for working, writing is for fun.

I like to be able to curl up on a couch or chair and write at will. Perhaps my next step would be to set aside a specific time of day to write but I feel that as long as I am writing something I don’t much care when I do it. I also find that after I get my initial post put down on paper (such as it is – electronically) all of a sudden the pressure is gone and I can day dream about which in the current roster of characters can advance the story in a fun, or interesting manner.

The rest of this sunday will be spent preparing for my kids school week. Waiting on responses to work projects, either feedback or approvals and releasing work to commercial printers or external vendors and suppliers.

Lazy Saturday in mid January.

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With nothing much going on except for some story beats percolating in the back of my mind. And a fairly simple question to answer. Do I want to do a dialogue heavy chapter with a little bit of detail, or recount the scene as though it was historical fact via a third impartial party? That is my question.

Both options offer me a unique way to hit on some story points with more emphasis. It’s a good place to be stuck in, I’d rather be spoilt for choice than drawing a total blank. I could do it over two chapters and show the divide between what actually happens, and how history interprets what went on by the evidence that they can find and piece together. Hard choice to make.

Also I’m a big fan of switching up how chapters are told, which is why I like the short/micro story format. If I had to write it all from one point of view I’d likely cock that up something awful. I can be passive, first person, third person or an objective witness as I see fit. I am amazed at people who can write 250,000 word epic worlds teaming with characters and animals, machines and vast world building. Sounds like a tonne of fun, but also – so much work.

As a side note, which is off topic: my kids are in love with this Youtube character named Sammie (who looks like a modified pink & purple butt plug) whose human counter part does arts and crafts. And in that vein I have sculpted two plug like pink/purple/sparkly Super Sculpey Sammies with glued in eyes and sculpted lenseless glasses. My oven burned the rear side of the sculpey which annoyed me as I didn’t want to have to paint anything other than the sculpted glasses. So yeah! Two sculpting projects down for 2022! Small win for me creatively.

How attached to your written characters are you?

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As far as I am concerned 99% of my characters are expendable, in as brutal or mundane a fashion as possible. I like to build something up only to fizzle in an unexpected manner, or for the pay off for the characters actions to be as empty as they tend to be in real life. We know the feeling. Same some bridezilla’s get after a year or two of planning a wedding, or a kid building up Christmas morning, only for it to come as this fleeting whisper of what you’d built up in your head, and then it’s done, and you are right back where you were, only now, your every waking moment isn’t spent pouring over details of this supposed magical day, and you feel a little empty or lost without the goal you’ve focused on so hard.

Then there are the 1% of characters who practically write themselves. They lead the story into unexpected territory, and can really turn one of my surface level short stories into something more compelling and create interesting problems to solve.

For those select few of you whom have read a couple of my interconnected shorts will know I don’t write my characters very deeply, they talk and do stuff, but their appearance is left fairly unremarked upon unless I feel there is a trait that sets them apart that will come up, or makes a point in the story. I’m not a “she breasted boobily” down the stairs kind of a writer, if that makes sense. Sure some characters have intercourse, but that’s not the point. Many are straight, lesbian, gay or androgynous or other, and I want them to be people, not their personal orientation.

To me they are just “folks”, they live, breathe, eat, defecate and work. They get irritated by one another and get snarky or playful as they see fit. If someone is going to affect a lisp or mumble it’ll be because they have a broken jaw, or were punched in the face. Not that I don’t operate with cliches or generalities, these are micro shorts so I need an explanatory short hand to fill in the blanks.

But, yeah… I like to kill them off. Or at least render their best laid plans moot wherever possible. I think that’s funny. Even my best laid plans fall apart at the hands of some one elses illogical choices, feelings and actions, so why wouldn’t that fate befall my characters too. These aren’t military disciplined combat troops, most are working class trades people silo’d into their own small social circles, or are corporate stooges looking to increase their bank accounts or prestige levels with little regard for those around them. Why would they do anything more than surface level planning for the pawns in their own games. Exit strategy? Not likely. Poisoned drink, or a bullet in the chest more like it.

Are you lot precious with your characters? Do you put them through hell or do you hold back on some? Are they fit for the meat grinder, or a mild annoyance?